A Small Flood (Night of March 19/20)

In the direction of Burnet, northward from the Creek, four to five inches of stormy rain fell the night of March 19th and the early morning of the 20th.

Flood waters where the Pool normally rests quietly.

Muddy Pond on overflow status.

March 21 and water continues to bubble up through a
two-inch hole in the middle of the driveway near Large Oak #2.

Pressurized water bubbling up through a rocky road.

Stone Surfaces (March 18)

 

 ...because of...

Along the Way (March 16)

     Also along the way to the Creek we find the following: a field of verbena, a kind musician found playing guitar on his back porch, a fire hydrant that truly will never be used, a father and son repairing their section of the road, plenty enough March flowers to make for a gorgeous way into this little canyon, and tiny ants burrowing nests into a hard-packed drive way.

Juan

Walter and his son Kevin.

    And along the way to any good thing fall an unknown number of other good things.  Such is the unavoidable tragedy of life lived in a world that remains, as Stephen Crane wrote, "flatly indifferent."  The same world is a beautiful one, no doubt, but what it pays in beauty it demands from other beautiful things.
     And so it is with life at the Creek.  We try to build a small place to live where we can be close to the natural world and encourage its rightful existence, but along the way we will inevitably snuff out about as much as we hope to save.  That's what happens along the way to a good goal.  The ruining of a canyon wren's nest is only the latest example.

Canyon wren unmade 

Nest minus one egg that fell to the floor

Materials for nest: insulation, bark, twigs, wood shavings,
leaves, roofing nails, and sheet rock screws

The nest was hidden up in that right can light.

Sunset Rising

Shepherd's-purse (Capsella bursa-pastoris)

1796 figure from Deutschlands Flora in Abbildungen

    

 Let me recommend the beautiful site referenced above:

http://www.biolib.de/

          Now back to the other side of this small canyon, to the echo of a sunset rising up a bluff.  As everyone knows, sunset rises when it's seen as an echo in the east.

March 4, 2012 (18:21:07)

March 4, 2012 (18:21:25)

March 4, 2012 (18:21:47)

March 4, 2012 (18:22:02)

March 4, 2012 (18:22:23)

And some more of H.'s images:

 Lesquerella recurvata

     A beautiful specimen, no doubt.  And even a beautiful Latin name.  But we understand why sometimes the Romance language is better remembered for a piece of botany: this flower's common name is Gaslight Bladderpod.  The native of Texas is in the mustard family (our garden is currently shining fence-to-fence in tall, yellow blooms of the domesticated mustard plant).  The opening image to this blog post is also one among the mustard family.

The hairs of  Lesquerella recurvata

Redstem filaree or Common Stork's-bill (Erodium cicutarium)

         Right now, this ground-hugging spring flower covers our local fields and yards.

(the sort of art to which I aspire...when the building of this Creek house is complete)

Original book source: Prof. Dr. Otto Wilhelm Thomé Flora von Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz 1885, Gera, Germany.


And another of the same:

From Flora Batava, Volume 1 (1800)

Source: www.biolib.de